New Member

I’m also curious about upgrading a few drivers. Like others I owned B&Ws years ago. I’ve mostly had my own home built speakers lately using the “finest European” drivers (which are mostly made is China these days anyway).

Sound is subjective. I briefly listened to a B&O Audi A4-wasn’t impressed. I owned a HK BMW 328 that I thought sounded pretty great/fun. I also have a HK Subaru that I thought was terrible so I gutted it and used new amps, speakers and DSP. A lot comes down to personal preferences and where the manufacturer placed the speakers.

I think the M3 is pretty solid but I like the tweeters I put in the Subaru better. They are a Vifa silk dome with a damped rear chamber, very flat off axis and low fs. I paid 30 each, but Tesla could probably have got for less than 5. I’ll bet that the m3 tweeters are at best a $2 <25mm al dome. At worst Mylar. The mids sound like undamped paper coated with something plastic. Anyway I would love if someone posted pictures of each driver and sensitivity / response data. The woofers look like the ones I took from the Subaru which were 2ohms and designed to be super sensitive (to use less power). I suspect these are similar.

Anyway I find the sound to be pretty balanced and articulate just not lush/sweet. I think the bass on the m3 is better than the 328 but the imaging/stage on the 328 was better. This was because the 328 had mid and tw in the doors and a solid center ch. M3 has prob a 6.5 or 7 in the door and mid in the dash? Hence better mid bass but worse imaging. Trade offs. My Subaru DSP settings provide decent imaging for the driver, but crappy for the front passenger. I also have another mode that is so-so for both. The speaker locations and car acoustics are crap. I have 7s in the doors and no center. The tw play from about 1.6k.

I think replacing the tw and maybe the mid would help a lot. Depends where they crossed the tw, where the mid is... probably crossed pretty high becuse they used a mediocre tw with a high fs. Even if we did replace this tw the crossover is probably not accessible in the DSP. Not sure what they used for a center, but it seems a little lacking compared to the 328 too. I’m fine with the m3 bass.

So if anyone out there has some info on the m3 drivers and/or amp/DSP, let’s collaborate. We could probably even do a custom run of tweeters (e.g. tympany) if we get enough interest. A damped/coated or poly mid would be nice but probably not efficient enough for the stock amp? Would probably require an exotic carbon/Kevlar neodymium mid that would be expensive and hard to integate without access to the DSP.

New Member

Anybody have any experience trying to improve the sound system in the Tesla Model 3? I know, I know lots of people are saying rave things about the sound system. I just don't think those people have ever had a decent stereo in their car. More is not better as far as speakers go. You want good speakers finely tuned to the acoustics of a particular car and less is more. So, I am looking to fine tune the non-immersive sound speakers primarily and may ignore the immersive capabilities.

My observations of the Tesla Model 3 stereo compared with my old 2000 Ford Mustang GT with a Mach 460 system (stock speakers) and an upgraded Kenwood bluetooth stereo, a KDC-X7. I have no custom sub woofers, I don't need sound crippling bass.

* I can turn the Mach 460 system up to 10% and I would probably not be able to hear the Model 3 system that is set to 85% volume. The sheer power is just missing from the Model 3 stereo.
* There is no ability to make fine grained adjustments to the audio. Only volume and a 5 band equalizer. Having said that, I probably would not need an equalizer if the speakers are properly tuned for the car.
* The front speaker of the Model 3 near the front windshield sounds cheap
* The extra immersive speakers are a gimmick covering for the bands that seem to be lacking in the audio system.
* There sounds like there are bands missing in the music and it is not sounding full
* I am making a comparison of music that is streamed as Hi-Res from iTunes as a bluetooth source. I streamed the same music source in the Model 3 and the Mustang GT over bluetooth

Has anyone had a specialist like, Reus, try to tune their Model 3 stereo? I am not looking to replace everything. Maybe a pre-amplifier with additional tuning capabilities and better speakers will do the trick.

New Member

You can google there is a posting on a Reus upgrade for the 3. They replaced the front stage and added another center tw to the back on the mirror. Rues also put a new 10” sub in.

I agree that the front stage speakers sound “cheaper” than I’d like. I also find the center lacking. I can see why others might want a deeper sub, but the stock is fine with me.

Consumers could probably buy very fine sounding replacement front drivers branded as vifa, Dayton, peerless, etc. for <200 all-in. But mechanically integrating them would be an unknown and a pain. Also there is no known info on the stock amp and no info or control of the DSP.

Prob a few hundred more in cost on the build and we would have a elite system, but the fix to the aftermarket system is a cludge and 1000s.

I’ll wait and hope that with the 3s volume Tesla offers an upgrade path or allows a 3rd party some access to build an elegant solution.

Active Member

I agree with the OP. Music source USB stick, Apple lossless encoder. Sounds better than other sources but midrange muddy and tweeters tinny and shrill. Want to start by replacing some speakers first. I was thinking the 3 midrange under the front dash grille and tweeters and go from there.

Active Member

I agree with the OP. Music source USB stick, Apple lossless encoder. Sounds better than other sources but midrange muddy and tweeters tinny and shrill. Want to start by replacing some speakers first. I was thinking the 3 midrange under the front dash grille and tweeters and go from there.

This is pretty much my assessment of the Model 3 speakers as well. In other posts I have mentioned of how the immersion and dynamics of the system are excellent, but mid and highs feel tinny and unnatural. I've tested on 320kbps after breaking in the speakers recently.

Sound can be subjective, but I consider myself somewhat of an audiophile, not the most stringent. I have NHT 1.5's and a Paradigm Reference sub as my main setup pushed by a McIntosh amp.

Member

Does anyone have other suggestions for how to set the equalizer?
Today, I played around with a pink noise generator and an SPL meter (with FFT) on my phone. I used the A weighted sound and mixed the 5 bands until the pink noise was relatively flat. It was not what I expected. I ended with the bass near max, the mid bass a little above mid, the next two down like 1/3, and the highest one down 1/4. I can take a picture of it tomorrow. I listened to just a few songs in my garage. It did sound better. I'll have a better test tomorrow on my 30+ minute commute. I didn't try adjusting the position or immersion settings. But, I'm very interested in what other ears prefer.
(Side note, I really really like that home and aftermarket car systems will do the time alignment, levels and equalization for each speaker automatically for you now. It's a lot easier to get it pretty close than trying to do it manually. I wonder if we can get Tesla to support that! )

Active Member

Does anyone have other suggestions for how to set the equalizer?
Today, I played around with a pink noise generator and an SPL meter (with FFT) on my phone. I used the A weighted sound and mixed the 5 bands until the pink noise was relatively flat. It was not what I expected. I ended with the bass near max, the mid bass a little above mid, the next two down like 1/3, and the highest one down 1/4. I can take a picture of it tomorrow. I listened to just a few songs in my garage. It did sound better. I'll have a better test tomorrow on my 30+ minute commute. I didn't try adjusting the position or immersion settings. But, I'm very interested in what other ears prefer.
(Side note, I really really like that home and aftermarket car systems will do the time alignment, levels and equalization for each speaker automatically for you now. It's a lot easier to get it pretty close than trying to do it manually. I wonder if we can get Tesla to support that! )